Well.. I was going to post on Ben's "22 month birthday", which was on Sunday.. but I managed to stay away from the computer and didn't get around to it until today.. so 22 months and 2 days.



Ben's second birthday is coming up. This blows my mind. He's this wonderful little person. His birthday being just 6 days before Christmas makes the whole party planning thing a bit challenging. We've opted to have his party at a local kid's gym in our town. We've reserved the place so that the kids will have a place to romp around in without risk of toppling our christmas tree. Is it too cliche to go with a Thomas the Tank Engine theme?

My train of thought is a bit scattered today, so I'm going to share some little random things about Ben and some pictures.. enjoy!

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Ben LOVES mariachi music. He sings "YA..ya.. ya yaaaaaaa.." and dances the mexican hat dance. We typically have a CD playing in the car with mexican music that we copied from his daycare provider. I'm actually starting to learn the lyrics.. I have no clue what the words mean.. but I can sing along! As an aside.. we were listening to it about a week ago and shiela started laughing and said "he just said that the burro is crazy in the head". what kind of children's songs are these?

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Ben can now say "apple".. clear as day. He refers to anything that comes in a small serving sized container with a metallic film cover (i.e. applesauce, yogurt, jello, etc.) as "apple". It's very cute. He wakes us up now by talking about apples. He also signs apple.

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Ben is still addicted to Thomas the Tank Engine. He can now sign "Thomas please" and "more Thomas please".. well.. he signs "train please" and "more train please". yesterday he was home with shiela and he wanted to watch Thomas and she wasn't jumping quickly enough so he went and pulled her by the shirt and then reached over and rubbed her belly. He knows that to sign "please" you rub on your belly. He knows he's cute.

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We spent his 22 month birthday in Gloucester. We needed to see the ocean and wanted fresh air. We went to a state park and spent the afternoon playing and then hit up a local seafood restaurant for dinner. Ben was asleep and snoring before we made it home.

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Ben says "water" by saying "wah wah..". He refers to anything that he wants to drink as "wah wah..".. if you say "do you want some milk", he typically spits out his binky and says "wah wah!!!"

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Ben's mom sent him to school today with black pen marks on his face.

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Ben is about 27.5 lbs and is 34 inches tall. He's about 50% for height and weight. His feet are HUGE.. size 7 extra wide. It's like looking at a puppy.. big ol' head and feet.. i'm curious whether he'll hit the 6 foot mark or not.

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Ben was 5 lbs 13.8 oz when he was born, 4 weeks and 4 days early.

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We used to call Ben "the jellyman".

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We always said that Ben would not be a "Benji".. but now he is.

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When you ask Ben if he's ready.. he yells "GO!!!" (for "ready, set, go!")

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